Samuel Paul

Ethel and Norman Thayer are an old couple living "On Golden Pond". Their daughter, Chelsea, is 42 years old, and has never been married. She is dating a 45 year old dentist, and brings him up to Golden Pond to meet her parents. Her boyfriend, Bill, has a 14 year old son named Billy, who comes along. Young Billy has been virtually raised by his mother, who is newly divorced from his father. The troubled child is left with the elderly Thayers for some time, as his father and Chelsea take off for a tour of Europe. Character-driven story about an elderly man coming to terms with his age, and the nearing of death; a middle-aged woman attempting to enter into a father-daughter relationship with her dad, whom she has never known closely; and a young teenager dealing with parental divorce.

A celebration of the life of Zora Neale Hurston, who was born at the turn of the 20th Century and grew to be an important voice with her written portrayals of Black American life in the rural south of the 1930's and 40's, and the stories, songs and folklore that were her heritage and inspiration.

A substantial insurance payment could mean either financial salvation or personal ruin for a poor black family.

Jessye Norman is a regal Ariadne, the mythological Greek heroine in this opera-within-an-opera, opposite the passionate Bacchus of the great James King. Kathleen Battle delivers the coloratura fireworks of Zerbinetta, the leader of a commedia dell’arte troupe that finds itself stranded on Ariadne’s island. Tatiana Troyanos and Franz Ferdinand Nentwig star as the young Composer and the Music Master in the opera’s prologue. James Levine brings out all the color and charm of Strauss’s brilliant chamber-sized score with its equal amounts of pathos and humor. Bodo Igesz’s production features sets by esteemed designer Oliver Messel.

Wagner’s Romantic opera demands singing actors who can truly inhabit their parts, and that’s just what we have here. Is it possible for a Knight of the Holy Grail to look more enticing than Peter Hofmann? No wonder Elsa (Eva Marton) falls in love at first sight. Marton’s heroine is innocent, but she is also a passionate, real-life young woman—which is good, because Leonie Rysanek is positively demented as Ortrud, the sorceress who accuses Elsa and Lohengrin of using magic. With James Levine’s superb conducting, the orchestra and chorus are similarly magical.

Live Metropolitan Opera performance March, 1985.

Leonora plans to elope with Don Alvaro, but he accidentally shoots and kills her father, who curses them as he dies. The lovers go on the run, but get separated. Bent on revenge, Leonora's brother Don Carlo, hunts them down. Verdi painted an immense canvas with this dark but tuneful opera, vividly brought to life in John Dexter’s production, with sets by the great Eugene Berman. The legendary Leontyne Price is seen in one of her greatest roles, Leonora. Price’s soaring voice encompasses every nuance of Leonora’s emotion as she moves from joy through resignation to ultimate heartbreak. James Levine’s brilliant leading of the Met orchestra and chorus is a lesson in Verdi style. Giuseppe Giacomini is Alvaro, the man Leonora loves, and Leo Nucci is Don Carlo, the dark instrument of their Fate.

In his book "1984", George Orwell saw the television of the future as a control instrument in the hands of Big Brother. Right at the start of the much-anticipated Orwellian year, Paik and Co. were keen to demonstrate satellite TV's ability to serve positive ends-- Namely, the intercontinental exchange of culture, combining both highbrow and entertainment elements. A live broadcast shared between WNET TV in New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, linked up with broadcasters in Germany and South Korea, reached a worldwide audience of over 10 or even 25 million (including the later repeat transmissions).

A performer/artist with a bag of vaudeville tricks and the help of his trusty piano player must prove to a critic that there is still a way to present New Theatre without relying on devices. Like trampolines.

Ken Talley is 32, strong, goodlooking and a Vietnam vet with both legs shot off seven years earlier. He is somewhat cynical. His lover Jed is bigger and stronger, a gardner, a good listener. On Independence Day 1977 Ken's home in Lebanon Missouri is visted by the others. Much of their past relationships, pre- and post-Vietnam, must be pulled up and examined before any of them can decide their future.